Foundation Courses

RLE 500: INTRODUCTION TO THEOLOGY

This course employs an intensive online format introducing students to fundamental philosophical concepts, an overview of church history, the historical-critical method of biblical scholarship, and key concepts in systematic theology. The course requires the students to employ online and traditional research skills to complete a short research paper for each of the four main topics.

RLE 501: INTRODUCTION TO BIBLICAL STUDIES

This course introduces students to the theory and application of biblical interpretation methods. Students use the historical-critical method: form, redaction, source, feminist, and post- modern criticism, along with other recent approaches. Internet resources for biblical studies and biblical studies software are introduced and evaluated.

RLE 503: FOUNDATIONS OF CHRISTIAN FAITH

This course introduces students to the theory and application of biblical interpretation methods. Students use the historical-critical method: form, redaction, source, feminist, and post- modern criticism, along with other recent approaches. Internet resources for biblical studies and biblical studies software are introduced and evaluated.

RLE 507: CHURCH AND MINISTRY

This course critically examines the identity and praxis of the community called Church. Particular attention is devoted to the ways in which the church has understood and expressed itself in the past, to the issue of leadership structures and their relation to the ministry of all the baptized, to the initiatives for ecumenical unity, and to the scope of the mission of a “world church” acting as a critical dialogue partner with the pluralist and secular world of our time.

RLE 509: CHRISTOLOGY

Using the contributions of critical biblical scholarship, this course reconstructs, from the various Gospel accounts, the traces of what Jesus said and did during his ministry. The way Jesus seems to have faced death is compared with the way his death and resurrection were interpreted by the early church. Moving through the Christological developments of the second to the eighth centuries, the course considers how contemporary human experience impacts on current theological interpretations of Jesus and his meaning for our times.

RLE 511: RITUAL AND SACRAMENTS

After exploring the social and psychological foundations for human ritual, the course considers the sacramental character of creation and incarnation. Particular attention is given to developing an understanding of Jesus as the primordial sacrament, and on Church as the continuing sacrament of Jesus. Consideration of the sacraments as actualizations of the Church is complemented with a study of the historical development of the sacraments in different Christian traditions. Students apply theology to sound liturgical practice in parish, school, and family.

RLE 513: PRINCIPLES OF MORAL THEOLOGY

Students explore the foundation of Christian ethics, with a concentration on these and similar questions: On what basis do people decide how to make moral choices? Why do we take the moral stands we do on issues facing the churches and society? Do Christians have different ways of making decisions than people from other religious or secular traditions? The course examines philosophical, sociological, and theological perspectives to these questions.

RLE515: Theology of Religions

3 credits

After examining the appropriate Vatican II documents, with a particular focus on "The Church and Non-Christian Religions" as well as "Religious Freedom," the students will survey the major world religions. The second part of the course focuses on Judaism, Christianity, and Islam in dialogue. The course also explores various perspectives on Christian ecumenism. Throughout the course, students will examine the Christian claim of Christ as savior.